Snaps: Food Tripping in Muar Town

So one fine day, out of the blue, Dad decided to head
down to Muar for a gastronomic food trip. A few years ago, we have done a couple
similar trips where the main and sole purpose of the trip was to eat all the
acclaimed food (usually found on the streets, old school kopitiam and no frills
restaurants) in the particular area, nearby or on the way. We did Ipoh, Taiping
and also Malacca. Top on my list is Penang, but we have yet to cover that.

This time around it was the Muar town because there was a local
food show which featured the Muar town. Dad headed online to the food blogs for
suggestions and guides on where to eat in Muar; he compiled a list of them and
we were off to Muar. We started the trip early because we were told that these
stalls are only open for breakfast and lunch. It’s a small town so the mornings
are where the action is. The journey to the town took us three hours and we
arrived just slightly before nine.

* * * * * * * * * *

Fried Carrot Cake | Roadside
stall, ftw.

Once we reached Muar town, we decided to go a few rounds around
the streets to roughly know where the food places are and which roads they were
on. After a couple rounds, we decided to park our car on a red street (the
buildings on the street are all paint the same colour, so they are colour
coordinated buildings on each street). When we got off the car, we saw a queue
building up for fried carrot cake at a roadside stall. Since
there were so many queuing up, we decided to join in and ordered one pack to eat
and share.

I found it extremely amusing to watch this uncle cook the carrot cakes, he
was cracking like 5 eggs at one go and then frying them up with the carrot
cakes. Like the earlier picture above, it looks pretty much like that and he was
doing it on repeat. Scoop pre-fried carrot cakes in, fry them a little, add
sauces, crack eggs and fry more.

And all this for just RM3.00. Food is so much cheaper in small
towns compared to bigger cities like Kuala Lumpur. I am not usually a big fan of
fried carrot cake so what I can tell you that it was tasty and
the style is different than the KL ones. Here, it is a milder version compared
to KL. Oh, this was a roadside stall so there was no tables and chairs provided,
the locals usually pack them up and eat them elsewhere like a local coffee shop.
So, we continued walking around until we reached a local coffee shop.

Just a note before I move on: For this trip, I was
shooting with my Olympus 45mm f/1.8 ED M.Zuiko Digital. I was
pretty much in a hurry to get my shots, so the pictures are not as focused and
clear as I wanted it to be. I am still learning how to use this lens for food,
bit tricky.

Muar Laksa | Hua Nam Chinese
Kopitiam

When this arrived, it looks sinfully delicious. It probably
also appeared that way for me because I was pretty deprived from
‘laksa’ for quite a while. Unfortunately though, this laksa,
as good as it looks was rather disappointing. The soup wasn’t the thick, milky
curry goodness I like. Taste wise, it was so bland, the Maggi curry flavoured
instant noodles tasted better. =.=

Mixed Innards Pork Stall |
Hua Nam Chinese Kopitiam

I remember my dad saying that you can eat all parts of a pig,
pretty much everything of or from a pig can be eaten. And in this stall, you’ll
find at least five different types of innards of a pig. They didn’t have pig’s
blood here though, but it was probably because it won’t go well in the soup.

Mixed Innards Pork Soup |
Hua Nam Chinese Kopitiam

The soup didn’t taste like much of overwhelming porky-ness, but
it was a rather clear soup. There isn’t much to shout about this dish. This was
served with a bowl of white rice. As for the innards, I don’t know how I should
describe them further. While I don’t loathe them, I do sometimes enjoy eating
them. So, this dish was fairly okay but not fantastic.

I was introduced to kuey chap, a flat, broad rice
sheets in soup, served with a mixture of braised pork meat, innards (yes,
again!), tofu and eggs. I’m a rather huge fan of anything braised,
especially braised duck, tofu and eggs. This was only my second time trying
this, the first was in Damansara Uptown and I loved that. So, I have my
expectation set against that. Having that as a comparision, I would say the
taste for the kuey chap here was milder and there was less “kick” I
would say. The plate of braised goodness, was nice nevertheless. Just that the
soup fell short.

I have always fancied these rice cakes ever since I was young. The
ones sold in KL are the size of flat bowls and the topped with a mixed of salty
and sweet preserved radish. But in Muar, the rice cakes are really really
ridiculously tiny.

There are 8 pieces in the picture above and the uncle who sold it mentioned
that he sells hundreds of them in a day. There were just so much effort to make
them so tiny, I do not understand why. Actually I do. It was tastier to
have them in bite sized pieces than one huge chunk. I quite like this.

After that, we left the kopitiam to do some walking around the
town. It was a rather pleasant day, the wind was blowing and the sun was
shining. It wasn’t the intense type, so it made walking around the little town a
rather fun, easy feat. Like most old towns, there are plenty of photo
opportunity everywhere. Unfortunately though, because I was there with my
family, they were pretty much walking really quickly which made it so much
harder to take pictures of any subjects. Here are some that I managed to,
anyway.

| Inside an old barber shop |

| A mural at the back lane
|

| The sugar cane man |

| The man who makes wooden coffins |

| The road side stall |

During the walk about, there were actually plenty of roadside stalls selling
all kind of food. But most of them at 10am were either close or they have just
started opening their stall, so there actually wasn’t a need to arrive in Muar
so early.

Muar Otak-Otak | Avenue 4 Food
Court

We came across many stalls selling otak-otak and I must confess that
those were my favourites. I couldn’t resist one. Well, actually I had more than
one. This was really good, I don’t think you can go all that much wrong with
otak-otak. :)

Wantan Noodles | RM3.50

After much walking around, we arrived at an acclaimed
wantan noodles stall which was said to be the best in Muar. They were
still setting up their stall when we arrived and we saw countless plates of
wantans being placed in the fridge along with boxes load of noodles. At
that point, it crossed my mind that it was so good that they sell so much in a
day. And boy, was I wrong. It was the worst noodles I have ever eaten in my
life. Even for RM3.50 I wouldn’t pay for it. The wantans skin was so
thick, you might as well eat flour sheets. The soup was tasteless and the
noodles was just bland. The char siew was meh.

Chicken Rice Balls | Jit Fatt
Restaurant

After such disappointing luck with the noodles, we decided to
head off to another recommended place to have chicken rice balls. I was with my
dad when he was reading the review for this place. The blogger had claimed that
it was really delicious and what not. BUT GUESS WHAT HE MUST HAVE NEVER
TRIED CHICKEN RICE BALLS FROM MALACCA. BECAUSE THIS WAS THE WORST
CHICKEN RICE, don’t even say chicken rice ball. Even just as a plain chicken
rice, it was easily one of the worse chicken rice I have ever tasted.

I was pretty much so frustrated, that I told my Dad, “Can we
just leave Muar for Malacca? There are so many better food in Malacca than
here.” And my dad agreed! So, we were off to Malacca then. But before that, I
wanted to try so badly this lime and lemon drink from one of the
roadside stalls.

Lemon Lime Juice | RM
5.00

And damn, it was the best lime and lemon drink I have ever
tasted. It was so strong, rich in the natural flavour of the lime and lemon. You
can tell that this was 100% pure juice, it was one of those powerful
drink you have for when you have an impending sore throat and you’ll be cured
from it immediately. It was that good. So good, that we got a huge bottle of it
for only RM5.00.

If you are ever in Muar, please just get this. This is Muar’s
only saving grace, Muar is hardly a place for any gastronomic feast, I probably
will never step my foot there anymore. Or I’m just having the worst luck in Muar
when it comes to food, because one of my friend mentioned that food in Muar was
nice. I didn’t go the same places she did, but the ones I had were
disappointing.

* * * * * * * * * *

I’ll end this post now, and I will continue the Malacca part in
another blog post. Do look out for the other post!

14 comments:

Carmen! You are making me hungry AND thirsty! Great photos as always, but you know I'm back in the land of snow and hamburgers, no fair! I especially like the folks eating at the roadside stall, I can feel a whole community right outside the frame, well done.

Sorry to hear not all the food was to your liking, even disappointing. But I think your standards are pretty high! The food in your pictures looks very tasty indeed, too bad it didn't always taste as good. I am curious to see what you think of Malacca. I always enjoyed the food in Malaysia tremendously. Thanks for sharing these nice shots and your food critique with us!

Haha, I think it's probably because the ones I had before taste much better that's why I didn't like these too much. Do come by Malaysia if you can, it's a food haven here. Tonnes of street food everywhere :) I'll be posting up the Malacca one soon, do read that!

I don't know what exactly they're called, but mum used to stock up loads of that for me. It's something like kaya Puff shape but filled with meat. And kaya balls from astaka! Though u can pretty much get there from anywhere....

I must say you are wrong about the food in Muar..way better than the commercial stuff in Malacca, just your luck you were eating at the touristy areas, I never see any local Muarian's Fav food haunts in your post..and I live in Singapore...

Hello there! Thanks for your comment. Unfortunately we may not have been able to try the better food in Muar. It would be great if you can share with me the local food haunts that you know of. Please reach me at itscarmenhong@gmail.com. I'm planning to trip down there next week so it'll be perfect to try your suggestions then.